A Rediff Business article reports that Minister of State for IT and Communications Sachin Pilot expressed his views on getting rural India on the broadband Internet bandwagon. "The commitment of the government of India has been that by 2012, we will connect every single panchayat with high-speed broadband access," Pilot said at the Bangalore IT.Biz conference. There were talks about the challenge of low broadband connectivity and high broadband costs in the rural interiors of the country. Their motive is to connect the panchayats (local government body in a village) with Internet for better interfacing between the citizens and the State government and transparent delivery of services.

Come to think of it, we've come to a stage where wired Broadband Internet is common fair, at least in metros and many towns in India. Government-owned BSNL's cost for a 2 Mbps connection starts at a low Rs. 125 albeit for a paltry 150MB. While, in Mumbai and Delhi you've got MTNL that's even cheaper at just Rs. 50 for 200MB of usage. Despite 3G being awfully delayed in this country, thanks to the 3rd generation CDMA technology (EV-DO), big privates like Tata and Reliance are able to offer theoretical 3.1 Mbps wireless broadband services.

As the world's Internet keeps getting faster and faster, the key for providers is to consistently give users increments in speeds, while keeping the costs the same. Another major thing to work on is the reliability of their service. That, along with Internet penetration in rural areas, will truly put India prominently on the world's Internet map.